Department Store Fun reprinted from TAP Magazine. By Agent 81.
Many of the department stores in my area use a large plastic device stapled
to the clothing as a security precaution. Several years ago, an adventurous
friend of mine got ahold of one of thes somehow, and we took it apart. Inside
was a heavy paper strip laminated to aluminum foil (?). As I recall, this
paper strip was about half an inch wide and 3-1/2 inces long. When this device
got close to a pillar or column at the exits of a store, an alarm would sound.
My friend put this paper in his wallet, and we had a lot of fun wandering
in and out of various stores at a local shopping center. We would enter when
a group of people would enter, or exit with several other shoppers all
together.. When we entered a local Sears in the shopping center in the main
corrider of the indoor mall, a loud bell rang. A family with kids was just
leaving. The nearest clerk ran out the entrance to look at everyone standing
around. A plain clothes security guy appeared out of nowhere. Everyone had
a good time. The next store we went in was also packed with people and the
manager (?) got paranoid when the alarm went off. If you move about discreetly
and don't wear a jacket or coat, you can liven up the busiest of stores. But
don't go into an empty store with one of these in your wallet. That's a no-no.
Could pleas secure a quantity of these paper strips and send them out with
your next issue? Or offer them for sale? They can be great fun, especially in
a Xmax shopping mob. The one we had came unlaminated and wouldn't work any
more. This might be a great money maker for TAP. You may even want to devote
an entire issue to this neat gadget. These strips could be left inside candy
wrappers and in the bottem of a coke cup and placed near these detector columns
or pillars. Put one in a plant near a pillar. The uses and fun could be end-
less. A good senior class project would be to freak out ever alarm in every
store so equiped, at 2 PM some Saturday afternoon when the mall is really
packed.